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Turning Worry into Worship

Yesterday, we began considering the way worry works against worship. We ended with two specific steps you can take to combat worry in your life.

As we continue today, let's begin with these questions:
Do we all have the same capacity to become "worry warts?"
Are all people equally likely to become hazardously anxious?
Are some people more prone than others to worry?

As you have probably discovered among your own friends and family, some people are more anxiety-prone than others. This tendency can come from various directions.

Several years ago, Minirth, Meier and Hawkins authored a very helpful book, Worry-Free Living, which addresses anxiety from biblical, medical and psychological perspectives. They identify a significant variable that can help us recognize some who are very likely to be anxiety prone. Can you guess what it is? It's the person's personality.

Those with "Type A" personalities (known by psychiatrists as "obsessive-compulsives") are prime candidates for stressful anxiety. Type As are often described as intelligent, perfectionistic, seldom overlooking details, and a bit obstinate.

They are usually dedicated workers, neat in appearance and orderly in work habits. They tend to be logical, more facts-oriented than feelings-oriented. They're good problem solvers and they're competitive. Type As can also be a bit adversarial! They may take an opposing view and build a good case just for the fun of it.

Type As set high goals; then they work like a dog to reach them. If they can't reach their own high goals, they feel crushed. They have no tolerance for mediocrity, and have the same unrealistic expectations of others that they do of themselves. Of course, unrealistic expectations lead to frustration - and this frustration leads directly to more anxiety!

As if these tendencies were insufficient in themselves to create high anxiety in the Type A, the Type A operates like this in an environment that itself is stressful. They often select a career characterized by extensive training, challenge and stress. Music, medicine, the pastorate and certain business careers are good examples of the kind of career often chosen by a person with a Type A personality. Consumed by work, driven to achieve, guilty about relaxing, you know the type and readily see their predisposition to anxiety. Fortunately, there are ways to escape the anxiety trap-even for Type A personalities!

There is another variable which may surprise you: birth order. As Minirth and the others point out, "first-borns" are most likely to have Type A personalities. They tend to be conscientious, and they tend to be achievement oriented. They're often jealous of attention given to their younger brothers and sisters. They're often angrier than their brothers and sisters. They tend to be tense and driven. Sometimes this tense or driven nature is unconsciously communicated by the high expectations of parents, who gradually relax as other children are born into the family.

First-borns tend to make friends more slowly than their siblings, and as loners, consequently, they are less comfortable sharing their feelings with friendly sounding boards. Schoolmates are seen as rivals, not confidants. Their harbored emotions and worries - of course - do them no favors.

If you are a Type A personality, as I am, you may be feeling a little desperate right now. You can't change your personality, and you can't change your birth order. What CAN you do? You're probably wondering, "How can I renew my mind? How can I reduce my anxiety? How can I turn my heart away from worry and turn toward the kind of true worship that pleases God?"

One step we need to take early in the process is to detect defense mechanisms we are using to fool others - or ourselves. This kind of cover-up is often associated with some version of these words:

"I'm just going to do it this once...."
"This isn't really hurting me—or hurting us."
"Everything is fine...."
"Honey, this is only temporary; pretty soon I'll be able to slow down."

Well has God said through Jeremiah (17:9), "The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it?"

"Search me, O God, and know my heart," David prays in Psalm 139:23-24, "Try me and know my anxieties; and see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting."

Proverbs 4:23 admonishes, "Keep your heart with all diligence, for out of it spring the issues of life."

These scriptures remind us soberly that when our guard is down, deception can enter our hearts. We need God's light, shining the truth into our hearts and chasing away self delusions.

Two disciplines of our worship are the detection of self-deceit and the protection of our hearts. How does God help us detect deceit and protect our hearts? Here are 3 ways:

(1) He takes us to His Word. "For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart" (Hebrews 4:12).

(2) He brings friends to our side. Loving, frank friends are an invaluable blessing. "But exhort one another daily, while it is called "Today," lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin" (Hebrews 3:13).

(3) He teaches us as we walk with Him.

He nourishes us and sensitizes us to defense mechanisms that are quenching His work in our lives. As John 15 says, God prunes us each for a fruitful, fulfilling life.

Even the most anxious of us can take these 3 steps: Absorb God's Word, listen to godly friends and walk humbly and lovingly with God one day at a time. In so doing, you and I will find our hearts turning from worry to worship!